anna.yhshihWhen finished eating tangyuan (glutinous rice ball) at the Lantern Festival, it means that the Lunar New Year holiday has passed. For immersing in the atmosphere of the “New Year” celebration from New Year’s Day to the Lunar New Year, nearly a month of celebrating mood. It is the time to face those “New Year Resolutions” and even the weight gained from continually dinner parties.
However, this year’s nine-day long holiday reminded me of the time I didn’t spend with my family but in the shop with my foreign colleagues in London. The memories of cultural shock and the differences were just as vivid and exciting as ever.
Western society doesn’t celebrate the Lunar New Year, and of course, there is no banking holiday regarding it. So I was always on duty, then went back home to have a simple reunited dinner with flatmates and made a video call with family when they arrived into the New Year before us because of the jetlag.
During my time at the store, Lunar New Year became an essential holiday for boosting sales.
The date of the Lunar New Year is different every year depending on the lunar calendar, but it usually happens around the end of January or the beginning of February. And it was the quietest time for the shop, considering the end of winter sales and freezing weather in London. The left of bargains such as particular size or weird colour items, or new arrivals for spring, like a thin coat, didn’t trigger customers to spend. Therefore, it was an enormous pressure for every one of us in the store to boost our direct sales to those international customers, like Chinese or Arabian, before the pandemic.
In response to that significant sale opportunity, some stores began hiring Mandarin speakers to overcome cultural and linguistic barriers. Another girl and I came from Taiwan and made great sales with our communication skills and hardworking attitude. So we got some opportunities for giving some opinions of a different culture.
At that time, my store manager was one of the few people who attempted to add some Oriental elements to the window to attract Chinese customers during the Lunar New Year period. Different from recent years, various brands now have fully embraced Asian culture by putting decoration into windows, developing market-oriented products, or participating in sales festivals like Double 11 to interact with their target audiences. (Read more: Can more discounts or promotions continue to coost sales in 2022?)
By adapting some ideas, you can share warm feelings with your customers but be careful to understand the true meaning of every culture.
When the visual merchandiser presented me with a few thick white candles and asked if she could use them with red lanterns to decorate the window for a white coat, I was shocked by the cultural difference. Since the white candles are generally used at funerals, it is taboo for New Year’s. Eventually, I stopped her from making the tragedy.
In addition, I prepared some oranges or tangerines from Tesco and put blessing couplets on them to make more festive vibes to the store. I also went to Chinatown to get candies on the till to share the luck with everyone, as stores do during the New Year. When it was not busy, I tried to stop girls from eating all candies preparing for customers and taught them some blessings in Mandarin to use to greet Chinese customers coming into the store. When Chinese customers heard them use rusty Mandarin to say “happy new year” (Xīnnián kuàile), they felt warm from these greetings, especially on these special days when we were far away from home. I saw both my colleagues and customers were happy to get closer by these little actions of knowing more about each other’s cultures.
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Those were part of memories and lessons I learned from those cultural shocks; I wish to share more with you this year by writing them down. I hope you everyone reading this post a Happy New Year 新年快樂(Xīnnián kuàile)!
